REPS Wildflower Walk at Barren Grounds on Saturday 8Th October Meet at the Picnic Parking Area at 10.00Am
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Eucryphia ISSN 1037 – 2032 Number 115 – October 2011 Robertson Environment Protection Society – to promote the protection and enhancement of the Robertson Environment PO Box 3045, Robertson NSW 2577 www.reps.org.au OCTOBER REPS Walk REPS Wildflower Walk at Barren Grounds on Saturday 8th October Meet at the picnic parking area at 10.00am. Instead of a Friday night talk in October we take the opportunity each year to go out on an easy walk. The wildflowers are always wonderful at this time of year with Boronia, heath and many others which can be seen along the Barren Grounds tracks. We will have a plant list for reference but bring a plant book, if you like, for further checking. There will be time for photography and bird watching so a camera and binoculars could also be Dampiera stricta David Tranter a good idea. Wear a hat, sensible shoes and clothes that allow for changeable weather; bring your lunch and a NOVEMBER REPS AGM and Talk drink in a backpack to have out on the track if the day is fine. “The Southern Highlands Barren Grounds Nature Reserve is 14km along the Sustainability Hub” Jamberoo Mountain Road from the Pie Shop and An exciting new Wingecarribee the picnic parking area is about 1km in from the initiative entrance. Guest speaker is Tim Edwards, project coordinator All Welcome. Further information, phone for the Wingecarribee Sustainability Hub th Helen Tranter 4885 1394. AGM Friday 11 November, 7. 30pm All welcome, open discussion, light refreshments, gold coin donation Upcoming Events th Sat 8 October – REPS walk “Wildflower walk at Barren Grounds” 10.00am , Barren Grounds picnic area th Sun 9 October – CTC Cinema “Genius Within – Glenn Gould” 2pm at CTC@Robertson, see page 8 th Fri 11 November – REPS AGM and Talk “The Southern Highlands Sustainabilty Hub” see above th Tue 15 November – NPA Talk “The Land of the Thunder Dragon”’ by Tony Hill, 7.30pm, CWA Hall MossVale, see page 7 th Sat 29 October & 26thNovember – Caalang Creek Working Bee from 9.30 onwards, see page 8 NPA Walks – see page 5 President’s Report You may recently have heard on news radio that Allan Stiles geneticists have ascertained that Australian Our August meeting proved to be one of great Aborigine settlement of Australia goes back to the interest and the very large attendance was earliest of migrations of Homo sapiens out of gratifying. John Bradshaw’s account of his Africa. That Aborigines have been custodians of experiences in the Kimberley solicited many this land for a long long time was also brought questions and sales of his book quickly exhausted home to members of REPS when John Bradshaw supply. The October bushwalk and the November gave us a wonderfully illustrated recount of his meeting’s speaker will doubtless be worthwhile expedition, along with Adrian Parker and Chris too. Done, to see what are considered the country’s On Saturday, 3rd September a display was most ancient Aboriginal artworks, the so-called mounted at Mittagong as part of the Wingecarribee ‘Bradshaw Figures’. These are in caves of the Shire Council’s Threatened Species Day event. remote Prince Regent’s River of the Kimberleys, Thanks to Peter Glass and Leon Hall who helped to and were so called because they had been “fly the flag” by discussing REPS and its activities discovered by John’s great uncle Joseph Bradshaw. with enquirers. After Joseph’s small syndicate had purchased a At the Robertson Nature Reserve on the following large holding in the area on spec from the Saturday, several people attended to learn about the Government, he had led an expedition in 1891 to beautiful and fascinating plants that can so easily inspect their ‘prize’. The country turned out to be be enjoyed there. Thanks to Helen Tranter and rugged, forbidding to agriculture and, long before Leon Hall for sharing their knowledge then. GPS navigation, difficult to either map or The committee has worked well this year but there determine boundaries. The legacy of that is need for increased membership. Please contact expedition and brief occupation was that Joseph me on 0415 309 760 if you are available. who, like his great nephew John was an educated man, left a good account of things he saw, Secretary’s Report including comprehensive descriptions of that most Georgina Persse ancient rock art that he had found. Testament to its REPS COMMITTEE MEETING - 9th September age was the fact that present-day Aborigines, who Present: Allan Stiles (Chair), Peter Glass, David regularly must re-touch their rock art, lay no claim Mee, Georgina Persse, David Tranter, Helen to the ‘Bradshaw Figures’ which have survived un- Tranter. Apologies: Leon Hall, Chris Stevenson, retouched due to the remarkable environment and Anne Wilson. the peculiar chemical consolidation in the rock The November meeting details for the AGM and surface. How old? 20,000 years perhaps. speaker were finalised, also those for the October Well, as noted, navigational pinpointing was nigh Barren Grounds Walk. REPS presence at the impossible in 1891, and Joseph’s descriptions of Waratah Spring Fair was confirmed, and ideas put locations were not as good as the descriptions of forward for DVDs to show at the December the actual works – they became lost for a century. meeting. Helen Tranter reported that, with the full It is significant that it was great nephew John and house and donations given, the August meeting his two determined colleagues who found them was also a financial success. Leon Hall sent notice again in October 2003 after an arduous search in of continuing mulching and spraying at Caalang the rugged terrain, stifling weather and biting bugs. Creek with perhaps some planting in late What has resulted has been documentation of September. newly discovered plant and animal species unique Allan Stiles reported work being done to to the area and wonderful photos of the rock art. strengthen membership numbers. Many of the photos can be found in their highly commendable book A KIMBERLEY August REPS Talk Review ADVENTURE – REDISCOVERING THE by Bob McInnes BRADSHAW FIGURES (Adrian Parker, John Review of “Rock Art in the Kimberleys”, Bradshaw and Chris Done, published by Gecko presented by John Bradshaw to the Robertson Books) which gives a very readable account of the Environment Protection Society on Friday 12 th expedition and its background, and beautiful large August 2011. (A4) photo reproductions. 2 What Price Risk? above. As greenhouse warming eased, the ocean by David Tranter cooled, allowing CO 2 gas to cross the air-sea interface and dissolve. Some became buried in the A carbon price or levy is a kind of premium to earth as coal and petroleum; some transformed into cover the risk of severe environmental impacts wood by old growth forests. from fossil fuel emissions and to encourage a swift From time to time, this fine-tuned climate transition to renewable energy. equilibrium has been upset by orbital forces that The earth is now in the warm phase of a natural move the earth closer to the sun or farther away. climate cycle which recurs every 100,000 years - As the warming earth emerged from the latest ice but there’s something odd about the current trend. age, so much dissolved CO 2 returned to the air that The concentration of the main greenhouse gas Torres Strait and Bass Strait became inundated by (CO 2) in the air (approx. 400 parts per million) is rising seas. The bulk of the world’s people that now the highest it has ever been in the past now live beside the sea are now faced with man- 800,000 years and rising fast in synch with fossil made inundation. fuel emissions. During previous warming cycles, What’s to be done about this nasty trend? An the ocean returned dissolved CO to the air above 2 economic system that allows CO 2 emitting like bubbles from a newly opened bottle of soda industries to ignore the environmental costs of their water. operations and let society foot the bill is This time, the ocean is getting more acid, intolerable. That malpractice is unreasonable, indicating that both air and ocean have exceeded inequitable and inconsistent with best-practice their capacity to absorb man-made CO 2. As a free-market principles; it’s a hidden subsidy. result, the best climatologists in the world are more Industry should meet its own production costs in than 90% certain that the natural warming trend is full and on time. The polluter pays! The proposed being reinforced by fossil fuel emissions - that we carbon premium addresses that inequity by are faced with a double whammy which is causing persuading polluters to change their careless ways, arctic sea ice to recede, tundra permafrost to melt, fund households for consequent rising costs and climate patterns to destabilize, sea level to rise and, develop renewable energy alternatives. ultimately, millions of climate refugees to appear And if, as a result, exports can’t compete with on our shores. imports, then perhaps it would be wiser to level the So what’s to be done about this unprecedented playing field by means of a “Border Tax” that problem? History provides a lead. Earth’s would encourage exporters and importers alike to primaeval, lifeless air was supercharged with be equally clean rather than equally dirty? volcanic CO and practically devoid of oxygen. 2 To make a donation to the Nature Conservation Now it’s got loads of oxygen and little CO 2. How Council of NSW in aid of their campaign to did that remarkable transformation come about? demonstrate community support for action on The magic molecule chlorophyll did the trick.